Death by Modern Medicineby Dr. Carolyn Dean, M.D., N.D. & Trueman Tuck, (Matrix
Verite, 2005, www.matrixveritew.com, ISBN 0-9737392-0-7, US
$25.99, CDN $29.99) Modern medicine is going through a civil
war that is being fought over the central principles of the
Hippocratic Oath: “Above all, do no harm.” Rather like the
American Civil War, what is at stake here is the basic human
right to one’s physical liberty and the freedom to choose
one’s destiny. A civil war is rather like a family row writ
large. In medicine it is the family of doctors and the row is
over money and power – what else? Physicians who long ago
sold out to Big Pharma’s corporate interests are at war with
colleagues determined to free medical practice from this
corporate corruption in research, regulatory systems, and
clinical practice and insisting on the patient’s right not to
be harmed.
Dr. Dean, a medical doctor, naturopath and researcher, brought
together in this book the evidence that modern medicine has
become, in its standard version, a death engine, not a
profession dedicated to healing the sick. What makes this
book so astonishing is that its sources all come from
mainstream medical research. The question of whether modern
medical practice might possibly do more harm than good arose
formally in the mid-1990s when the University of Toronto’s
Professor Bruce Pomeranz began an investigation with the help
of the databases of the FDA. Its results were so disturbing
that a great deal of further research was undertaken,
involving the leading medical teaching institutions of the
world.
This development is traced within this book in the context of
its much older historical roots. It is divided into chapters
that trace death for the patient by doctors, drug companies,
the healthcare bureaucracy, the media, the propaganda machine
serving interests unrelated to the patient’s needs, by drugs
and unnecessary medical procedures, by tainted science, the
cancer establishment, environmental chemicals, toxic foods
such as especially refined sugar, addictions, mechanisms of
denial, and by lifestyle choices that mostly aren’t choices
but based on wholesale corporate fraud.
This book is a wakeup call for health professionals and
patients alike, and although this is a deeply disturbing
excursion into the darkest (and most prevalent) aspects of
modern standard medicine, it is also profoundly hopeful and
helpful. It provides resources both for those who want to
know what to do to prevent disasters for themselves and their
families as well as for those who have the energy and
motivation to become politically involved. It is not a book
for those who wish to remain undisturbed and prefer to
maintain the myth that “my doctor must know best.”
This book appeared at a crucial moment in the history of
medicine. It is supported by and describes a movement in
medicine that is nothing less than a fundamental
soul-searching and recognition of its crimes against humanity.
As this book went to press, in March of this year, the UK
government published a damning report (often far stronger in
its use of words than Dr. Dean’s book!) entitled “The
Influence of the Pharmaceutical Industry,” which outlined the
disastrous consequences for public health and the integrity of
medical science stemming from trust placed in modern drugs and
corporate-sponsored research. In May, PLoS Medicine (Public
Library of Science - Medicine) ran an article by the
former editor of the British Medical Journal entitled
“Medical Journals are an Extension of the Marketing Arm of
Pharmaceutical Companies.” PloS is the only medical
journal that refuses to run ads and is freely available
on-line; it was founded a few years ago by some 50,000
disillusioned American medical students who wish to bring
medicine back to its Hippocratic principles. The leading
medical journals, such as the CMAJ, JAMA, and
The Lancet, publicly discuss now the problems outlined in
Dr. Dean’s book. Late last year, the editors of the world’s
medical journals laid down new ethical principles for research
and study reporting. Some medical schools, such as Macmaster
and McGill in Canada, have re-structured their teaching
programs, starting this year, in order to renovate medicine
and combat the profit principle, which in medicine is nothing
less than death to the patient.
This important book is a report from the current civil war in
medicine and highly recommended, especially to readers looking
for evidence for their political, legal, and personal battles.
Activists will get the leads they need. Patients will find
the resources they are hoping for. Doctors whose conscience
is still intact will find support for their own practices.
Journalists stand in need of this book so they do not simply
print pharmaceutical press releases as fact. Medical
historians will find a wealth of useful sources and
interpretations.
Helke Ferrie is a Canadian
medical science writer who specializes in the politics of
medicine. She runs Kos Publishing Inc, a company dedicated to
books on nutritional and environmental medicine by doctors and
health practitioners. Visit
www.kospublishing.com.
